Free Homefront by Kristen Tsetsi Page B

opens it, blows
his smoke outside. “Ever since the anniversary… I don’t
know.”
    I give it a minute, keep from asking
what happened, but soon he sighs and shakes his head, so I
ask.
    “Don’t know,” he says. “Somethin’s
just—She changed, she’s different.” He taps the window. “She’s
leavin’, she says. Wants a separation. From me. From Donny. I’ll
give it to her, y’know, if she wants it, but she…four years. That’s
it?”
    “Why?”
    “I told you. Don’t like me goin’
out. Wants me home all the time when she’s home, and when I’m not
home she thinks I’m cheatin’, that there’s a girl at the bar, or
somethin’. But, goddamn, because—see, now, I don’t even think
that’s it. Control. It’s got to be. She’s mad if I’m out and she’s
mad if I’m home. I come home sometimes—sure, I was out a few hours,
okay—and when I walk in, she’s on the couch wrapped in that
blanket, from her neck to her toes like she’s in some damn cocoon.
Can’t get her out of there. And she won’t talk to me. Just stares
at the TV like she can’t hear me, can’t see me. Know what,
though…If she stays out ‘til eleven, I’m supposed to be okay with
that.”
    “Is there a girl at the
bar?”
    “Hell, tons of girls! Beautiful
ones, too.” He looks at me. “But I don’t want ‘em. What, you think
I’m cheatin’, too? I don’t cheat. I don’t do that. Why would you
ask somethin’ like that?”
    “I just—”
    “You just drive the car and watch
the road. Thinkin’ things like that. You…What kind of a person just
thinks that about another person?” He flicks the butt outside and
says, “Don’t even know me, and you—now, what’s the matter? Are you
cryin’?”
    “I’m fine,” I say, but the
windshield is a blur of black and white. I wipe my eyes.
    “Hell, I didn’t mean to make you
cry. I’m sorry. Here.” He fumbles in his pocket for his soft pack
and holds it between me and the steering wheel.
    “No, thanks.”
    He waits, then takes one out and
lights it for himself. “Yeah, somethin’s botherin’ you. I can tell.
You want to tell me what it is?”
    “I’m fine, really,” I say, but now I
want a one for later, when I can stop and smoke it alone. “Can
I—Well, do you mind if I take that cigarette, after
all?”
    “Thought you didn’t want
it.”
    “Never mind.”
    He shakes the pack until a filter
slides up and then pulls it out and hands it to me. “Want me to
light it for you, too?”
    “I’m going to save it for
later.”
    “You’re takin’ my cigarette and you
won’t even smoke it?”
    “I’ll smoke it, but later, if it’s
okay.”
    He plucks it from my fingers and
wedges it back into the box. “If I ain’t good enough for you to
smoke with me, then—”
    “All right. Okay? I’ll smoke
it.”
    “Now, why do you want to talk to me
that way when I’m givin’ you a present?” He takes it out again and
lights it, a steady flame held just short of the tip and his lips
tightening to puff, puff, sending small bursts of smoke into car
space. He holds it in the air, just over the center console. I
reach for it and he jerks it away. “You goin’ to tell me what’s the
matter?”
    “Nothing’s the matter.”
    “Doctor Donaldson. That’s me. You
need help. I can—I can! Come on, now.”
    “I don’t need—”
    “You’re goin’ through somethin’, and
don’t say you ain’t.”
    “Everyone goes through
something.”
    “But here, I’m givin’ you the chance
to talk about it. Not everyone gets that. Some people don’t have
people to talk to. Look here, I’m gettin’ out of the car in, what,
five minutes? Then you’ll be rid of me for good, if you want, but
don’t you think you’d feel better if you just said? Please,” he
says. “Now, I don’t say please very—I want to help, see?”
    “Okay.”
    He hands me the cigarette and I tell
him about Jake. He listens, no interruptions, and when I finish he
says,